


Oh Balls!

by Zoya1416



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Barrayaran Wedding Traditions, Embarrassing Request and Require, F/M, Imperial Wedding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-02-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 09:38:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3376742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zoya1416/pseuds/Zoya1416
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Laisa's father learns that his role as imperial father-in-law has special requirements.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Oh Balls!

Basil Toscane heard his wife making strangled sounds in the next room.

He hurried towards her, afraid that she'd choked or was otherwise ill. She had been fine this morning. But she was sitting in the largest of their three parlors, sunk into a fine golden-brown Aventi armchair and ignoring the spectacular soletta sunset. A communication tube was on the side table next to her, and she was gazing at a flimsy with red, blue, and gold tracery along the edges. He winced internally. Over the last four months since their daughter's engagement to the Barrayaran emperor, they'd seen quite a few of these communications. The emperor's social secretary (whom he'd learned was about as much a mere secretary as he was a mere trade ship owner) had punctiliously kept them informed of all the details of the wedding. Kept them informed one-sidedly that was, as the Komarrans had had very little input into the wedding planning.

“What do they want now? For Laisa to consummate her marriage before all the guests?”

He spoke in a frustrated tone, because most of Lady Alys' letters seemed designed to reassure them they would not be carrying on ancient customs, while giving them the modern version which hinted at the old. He'd boggled at the last one. It appeared that he would be required to lead Laisa on a horse (a horse! He'd had a quick run-down to the Serifosa Dome zoo to look at one. The animal was huge. Were they trying to kill Laisa? That would make no sense.) to her appointed location on a primitive outdoor grain circle. You could hardly mistake the fertility message of the grain. And what, he wondered, would the Barrayarans do if it rained on the Emperor's wedding day? Carry on in soggy fortitude? He wouldn't put it past them. If Laisa was properly engaged to another Komarran, they'd never have to consider this weather complication. They'd have the ceremony indoors, in a civilized manner.

His wife gasped again, and Basil realized that she was laughing. “Not exactly...consummate...but it seems that the old Barrayarans required proof of health before marriage.”

“Making sure the other wasn't a mutant, I'll warrant.”

Maribella and he had requested all the book discs on Barrayaran customs as soon as they had learned their only daughter was going to marry a brute. The severe prejudice against correctable medical problems was appalling. It was all due to their descending to the stone age and losing any galactic knowledge they'd ever had. 

Conversely, emotional disturbances were tolerated in the extreme. Gregor Vorbarra's family line had included both a mad mass-murderer emperor and even crazier other relatives. Vorbarra seemed normal, but he was the foster son of the Butcher. Had Laisa even known this before she'd accepted him? It wasn't a secret. Who knew how they'd brainwashed him, in the years before his majority? 

At least Count Vorkosigan and his daunting wife were safely away from Barrayar during these preparations or no doubt they would have been demanding more concessions of the Komarrans. So far the only thing Laisa had been able to demand was that she be married in a proper Komarran split skirt instead of a wedding dress with a mile-long train. 

“Apparently, yes.” She was biting her lips, half way between humor and shock. “But they didn't have gene scans during the Dark Ages. So the custom was that the bride and bridegroom each have a physical exam on the day of the wedding.”

“Seems to leave it a bit late.” He scowled. “What did they do if they found out either of the parties was mutant? Cut their throats? Not a bad idea—I'm sure all the news reporters would get great footage out of it.”

“Basil, stop.” Now she was the one frowning at him. “You know they've made Komarr a wedding gift of a larger soletta, and we'll be able to charge more for our shipments.”

“He won't give us any more favorable terms—no official patronage—you know that. Laisa said so.”

“Mmm. Our customers won't know. They'll be happy to ship with us, assuming that the prices we charge are lower than prevailing rates. If our competitors want to keep their customers, they'll have to lower their own rates. Then they'll earn less, and we'll be able to snap up more voting shares.”

“Is there some softening in the Barrayaran position? Damn it, she should have found a way to help us come out on top. What's the good of marrying their emperor, anyway, if it doesn't gain the family anything? And what are you still snickering about?”

Maribella passed him the flimsy, and he read aloud. “Each to have a physical exam on the day of the wedding, to be attended by the parents and observers of the other—What! She's NOT GOING to be looked at by the Butcher, and that's final!”

“No, no, they're getting Countess Vorkosigan and some of the Emperor's mother's female relations. Keep reading.”

“Each exam to be witnessed by the other's parents...parents...oh no. Just no. That's not...I can't...you can't...we can't be required to look at him naked.”

“Think of the fun we could have dining out on the story—everyone will want to know what the emperor REALLY looks like, birthmarks, warts, and all. Although they'd probably cosmetically repair him, and we'd never know. But it seems it's only you they want, and a couple of male relatives.”

Basil considered his options. His uncle and brother were his closest blood relations, but each was seriously anti-Barrayaran. They held their fine noses even while trading with their nearest Nexus neighbor. 

“We could ask your brothers, I guess. Vav and Tey wouldn't turn down this opportunity.”

“All right. Let's ask them today and respond to Lady Vorpatril as quickly as possible.” She was still snickering as she made her way to the comconsole.

8888888888

Now it was the dawn of Midsummer Day, and he, Vav, and Tey were in a bland medical exam room in the emperor's palace. The anteroom held copies of Gregor Vorbarra's most recent imaging scans and his laboratory blood work. Vorbarra had somehow found time in the preceding week to have scans of the brain, chest, abdomen, pelvis...even the testicles, which were all healthy according to the physician. Now that it was documented that he could sire children, why they couldn't leave it at that? Barrayarans were a truly weird race. 

It seemed symmetrical, if unnecessary, that Laisa should undergo the same tests. They'd had them done together, she explained in the especially sweet voice she used every time she talked about her fiance. She had lost completely her Toscane negotiating presence whenever she mentioned him. Basil hoped she'd recover when she was safely wedded.

It seemed likely that Laisa and Gregor had engaged in a little peekabo and snuggle while they were in the privacy of a very discreet Vorbarr Sultana clinic.

He and Maribella had paled at her cooing recital—“and then I got these chest and abdomen and and um, other scans done—they didn't hurt at all, Mother and Father”—she'd assured him. “Not that I didn't already know, of course, but now they're assured that I have a functioning uterus and ovaries, which is of course the thing the conservatives most want to know!”

She'd then told them she'd have a breast exam at the time of her own checkup.  


Maribella was the one who recovered first.

HE'D narrowed his eyes in memory. Laisa's breasts had started developing at age ten and didn't quit until she was 15. Her mother's family all had large breasts—Maribella's were magnificent—all right, it was something which had attracted him to Maribella—but that didn't mean he hadn't glared at all the boys in three domes who'd dropped their glances to his daughter's chest before looking her in the eyes.

“Why, love? Why are you going to let them paw over you?”

Laisa had been a bit quick to reply. “Well, I guess they want to make sure I can nurture the Crown Prince!”

Silence had fallen over the Toscane household. It didn't help when Laisa said in a chirping voice, “Who wants to go out for ice cream?” Basil, and, he was sure, Laisa, caught the quick glance Maribella made to Laisa's hips. 

She glared at them. “Gregor likes me the way I am. He said that Lady Vorpatril had paraded—his words—every high Vor bud past him ever since his majority, and she'd not once tumbled to the fact that he admired curvaceous women! He won't care if I put on a kilo or two before the wedding!”

Basil quickly headed for his own study. Its masculine preserve had held him out of reach of most mother-daughter arguments—er, heated discussions. Why two grown women couldn't talk to each other as equals, instead of resuming the prickly tones of adolescence... well, he'd had a bit of it with his father, until the old tyrant passed away. Every time he'd seen the Toscane trade fleet master, he felt like a reedy thirteen year old again. This was before he'd filled out as an adolescent, and then, sadly, filled out a bit more. Diet and exercise was all the physicians would say, but they had no idea of what it took to run a consortium. Laisa had, alas, inherited his plumpness. At least she'd gotten Maribella's marvelous blue-green eyes instead of his dull brown ones.

Maribella was saying in a placating voice, “No, dear, of course he won't. But making over your wedding dress won't be an easy job, what with as many pearl and crystal strands as you'll have. Not to mention redoing all that lace so it drapes correctly. Imagine all those extra fittings!”

8888888888

The emperor's physician started with an exam which was not as superficial as Basil had assumed it would be. The black-haired, olive skinned emperor sat on the table in a (probably silk) set of undershirt and drawers, without a cover gown or modesty sheet. A pair of Vorbarrar armsmen stood to either side of the exam table, although why they were deemed necessary was unknown to Basil. He, Vav, and Tey had undergone patdowns themselves which were almost as thorough as his last physical exam.

The physician looked carefully at the imperial head, eyes, ears, nose, and throat, giving them a quiet narrative along the way. “Oculomotor functions intact, no enlarged lymph nodes of the neck,” and then for some reason, he had induced the emperor to bend down his head and have the scalp checked. Tey whispered quietly—“looking for head lice, are they?”

Basil couldn't resist a very tiny snort.

Neither the emperor or the physician acknowledged them, but the doctor continued in a slightly louder voice. “Scalp skin exam checking for abnormal moles as malignancy precursors is normal.”

“Please remove your undershirt.” The silk garment was pulled over the dark fine head without hesitation. The chest was not very hairy, although he couldn't say whether it had been recently depilated some for a smoother appearance. “Heartbeat and lung sounds are normal...no murmurs, rales, rhonchi, or friction rubs.”

Then they watched as the muscle movements were all checked. It was extremely strange to see the ruler of three worlds hold out his arms to his sides, move them overhead, have his thighs and calves felt. He performed all these functions with no change of expression. “Reflexes are all normal,” murmured the physician.

“Please lie down,” the physician requested. His voice actually wavered a miniscule bit.  
Perhaps he was a bit daunted at having to look at the emperor in front of galactic in-laws. The abdomen was palpated. “Liver, spleen, and kidneys are normal. There are no abdominal masses.” 

Clearly unnecessary since they'd been shown all these scans, but Basil decided it was all a show. He made a point of looking carefully, not closing his eyes.

“Please remove your underdrawers.”

The Komarran party had been briefed—so to speak—on this exam, too. They would indeed get to look at the emperor of three planets in the altogether. The directive for this had been titled, “We request and require” by the emperor himself.

The Vorbarra clan must be of very stern stuff, he admitted. He would not have wanted to be in the man's place and would have argued until the last breath. But the emperor stripped off his drawstring undergarment, swung his legs over the side of the exam table, and stood up mother-naked. He did not make eye contact with them, but stood looking straight ahead, standing still and tall as in a military drill. He hadn't had any pubic hair depilated, at any rate. That was a galactic cosmetic trend for both sexes which Basil opposed. Secondary sex characteristics included hair—it was a sign of adulthood. 

It was over very quickly at that point. He, Vav, and Tey had been informed that the emperor had had his prostate exam done before they arrived, and indeed documentation of it was on one of the reports in the antechamber. But he would have the imperial genitals palpated in front of them. Basil had been especially glad for the holographed message sent by Lady Alys, demonstrating what they would be required to see. He had gawked at the royal appendage. It took a quick look at a medical book disc to educate him. Oh. He'd never seen a circumcised penis before. Or anyone else's penis, since the days of his boyhood school showers. Now he looked calmly at the anatomy. Yes. He could testify that Gregor Vorbarra actually had quite a good sized cock. And he had normal balls, two of them, ready to sire his successor.

He, Vav, and Tey were then quickly whisked to their next station in the performance. They would be assembling on the appropriate wedding star and circle. THEY were the lucky ones. HE had a date with a white mare-beast. 

Now he was leading that mare, flower-garland festooned and thankfully very docile, carefully away from the house his daughter and bridesmaids had prepared in. The colored grain patterns of the wedding ritual were quite lovely, really. His daughter dismounted smoothly and made her way to the central circle, while he returned to a radiant but tearful Maribella.

“She's so lovely, love,” his wife sniffed.

“Yes.” He wished he could have taken the bridegroom aside for a bit of father-in-law advice, but if he heard one word that the emperor wasn't making his daughter happy, he would—he was standing in the first circle on his assigned start point.

He'd actually done it! Looked at an emperor in the skin. Well, a cat could look at a king, and he guessed a Toscane heir could look at his future grandchildren's father.

Now he stood with her, listening to the vows being recited in the warm air of the calm evening. Barrayar had decided to cooperate, and the flowers, ribbons, colored groats, and blue and red uniforms shone forth with glory.

It was only when he watched Gregor's fine dark head bend down to kiss Laisa that he felt a small grin come over him. He laughed to himself. How many people had ever watched the emperor of three worlds apparently being checked for head lice? Not to mention the rest of it. He would truly dine out on this story forever. Oh balls!


End file.
